Divine communicative goodness has been termed _benevolence_ when in intention, _beneficence_ when carried into effect. This is nearly the same as _moral rectitude_, because the government of the Universe must, that it may produce the good of the whole, be administered in righteousness. The correct administration of justice in rewarding every good, if there be merit in a creature, and punishing every evil is no less an effect of benevolence, than the conferring of benefits, which are purely gratuitous. In like manner the punishment of offenders in civil society has for its object general utility, whether we imagine the power which judges and inflicts, to spring from the social compact, or to have been ordained of God. The cutting off of flagrant offenders, as by the deluge, the destruction of Sodom, &c. has been obviously designed to prevent the spreading contagion of sin. But there is a time appointed, unto which all things are tending, and unto which men generally refer the wrongs they sustain, in which perfect justice shall be administered. Some attributes of Deity seem to be ground of terror, and others of love; but God is one; he is subject to no perturbation of mind; his wrath and indignation are but other terms for his steady and unchangeable goodness, bearing down the evil, which sinful creatures oppose to his purposes of general advantage. Those acts of justice which are accounted by the guilty to be unnecessary severity, are deemed, by glorified saints and angels, the effects of that goodness, which they make the subject of their Hallelujahs. Thus the highest proof of God’s goodness consisted in his not sparing his own Son, nor abating any thing from the demands of his law. After this all hopes that Divine goodness shall favour the finally impenitent must be utterly vain. Footnote 63: